“She'll be glad to have you back with two legs and two arms,” Julian said, touching his shoulder and moving on, aware of how inadequate such reassurance was, and yet it was all he had.
Tamsyn, lying in a hip bath of steaming water in her room in Elvas, was trying to decide whether her emotional collapse had done her any good with Julian St. Simon. She hadn't planned it, but it had happened, and it just might be turned to good purpose.
The colonel had clearly been moved by her story.
He'd been gentle and comforting, ordering his servant to make tea when her tale was told and her tears had finally dried. He'd sat with his arm around her on the narrow cot, saying nothing because there was nothing to say. She'd been more grateful for his silence than anything else. It took a sensitive man to resist the temptation to wade in with clumsy words of comfort that would only trivialize her pain.
Later he'd walked her back to Elvas and left her at her lodgings.
Thoughtfully, Tamsyn soaped her legs, grimacing at the filthy scum forming on the surface of the water. She'd need a jug of clean water to wash off the soap.
As if in answer to the thought, Senhora Braganza came puffing up the stairs with a copper jug of fresh water. Tamsyn thanked her and stood up in the tub. The Senhora poured the hot stream over her hair and body, and Tamsyn shuddered with pleasure as the dirt flowed from her body.
Her own shirt and underclothes had been laundered by the senhora, but they were beginning to show serious signs of wear, and her britches were almost beyond help. She needed new clothes, and the shops in Elves were plentifully stocked, but she had no money until Gabriel returned. Of course, once Gabriel turned, she wouldn't need to buy clothes, since he'd be bringing all her possessions as well as the treasure-her inheritance from her father that had been well hidden from his murderers.
Perhaps Colonel St. Simon could be induced to make her a small loan. It would give her an excuse to go and search of him again.
She dressed in her threadbare garments. The senhora hadn't been able to get the bloodstains out of her britches, but they blended with all the other stains accumulated in the two weeks that she'd been wearing them. At least her skin and hair were clean.
Tamsyn examined herself in the spotted glass that served as a mirror. Not too bad, considering. She felt purged in some way; as if by exposing herself to the horrors of Badajos, she'd lanced a festering boil. And somewhere inside her lurked a warm flicker of pleasure and relief that Julian St. Simon had survived the horrors of the assault.
She sniffed hungrily at the rich aromas coming from the kitchen and ran downstairs.
The senhora had prepared a hearty soup of cabbage, potatoes, and spicy sausage and watched with satisfied nods as her lodger consumed two large bowls and several thick hunks of crusty bread. Then, feeling ready for anything, Tamsyn went to fetch Cesar and rode out to the encampment in search of the colonel.
But as it happened, while Tamsyn was in the encampment, the colonel was in Wellington's headquarters, obeying an urgent summons that had taken him from his hospital visiting back into Elvas.
It was clear to Julian that the commander in chief was in a strange mood. His satisfaction in his victory was tainted by the loss of so many thousands of his best men, and his ruthless decision to give the survivors the run of Badajos did little to comfort him for that loss. Like St. Simon, he believed that if he'd made an example of the garrison at Ciudad Rodrigo in January, the garrison at Badajos would have yielded in a timely fashion and spared both sides indescribable agony. But public opinion would not have supported the uncivilized slaughter of a surrendered garrison, though it would turn a blind eye to the hideous sack and rape of the now-defenseless town.
“Julian, this business of La Violette.” He came straight to the point as the colonel entered. “Have you thought any more about it?”
“There's hardly been time,” Julian pointed out. “But my answer must be the same, sir. I can't possibly agree to such a thing.”
Wellington frowned and began to pace the room, hands clasped at his back. “We need her information, Julian. I'm going to drive the French out of Spain this summer and march into France by autumn. I need to know about those passes, and I need to have more freedom of movement where the partisans are concerned. Violette can make that possible.”
“I don't deny it.” Julian was beginning to feel he had a desperate rear-guard action on his hands. “But I also believe she'll sell the information for something other than my soul,” he added caustically.
“Oh, come now, man, don't exaggerate!” the duke chided. “Six months of your time, that's all.” His eyes narrowed shrewdly. “Forgive me for saying so-she must feel she has some grounds for believing you might agree to such a proposal.”
“She has no grounds,” Julian stated flatly. “No claims on me whatsoever.”
“I see.” Wellington scratched his nose. “Well, she is a most unusual young woman.”
“A manipulative, thieving mercenary,” the colonel declared as ?lady as before. “I will not be a party to her games. I'll lay odds, if you offer sufficient money, she'll spill her guts without blinking an eye.”
“Possibly, but I doubt it… Claret?” The duke strolled to the decanters on the table.
“Thank you.” Julian waited, knowing the battle was far from won. He took the glass offered him with a nod of thanks.
“I doubt it,” the duke continued as if there'd been no break in the conversation. “I have the unmistakable conviction that she knows her price and won't budge. She wants only one thing… and, Lord in heaven, I can't fault her for it. The poor little creature's all alone in the world; she can't be more than nineteen. What kind of a future is there for her here with neither friends nor family?”
Julian sipped his wine and didn't reply, remembering the girl's anguish and desolation. Despite that, he was convinced that “poor little creature” was not an accurate description of the orphaned daughter of El Baron and his English mate.
''I'm sure she'll be able to locate her mother's family,” the duke continued pensively. “But it would be better for her to present a more orthodox appearance. More convincing… more appealing, don't you think?”
“Perhaps,” Julian agreed dryly, not giving an inch. Wellington glanced up at him thoughtfully. “Well, if you won't, you won't. But there is something else I want to discuss with you.”
Julian waited during a lengthening silence, unconvinced that his commander in chief had given up.
“I don't need to tell you how skeptical the government is about this campaign,” Wellington said at last. “They say we exaggerate the importance of the victories that we win them at too great an expense of men and money. God knows, they'll have fodder enough for plaint when the casualties from this filthy business appear in the Gazette.”
Julian nodded. Everyone knew the opposition Wellington encountered from the English government and how near impossible it was for him to get the financial and material support he needed for the Peninsular campaign.
“I need someone to go and present our case at Westminster,” the duke said. “Someone reliable, someone the government will respect, who'll give a firsthand account of the campaign. Dispatches don't present the case adequately, and civilian observers are the very devil! They haven't the faintest notion of what's going on even when it's under their noses.”
“And you're fingering me for the task,” Julian said without inflection. He refilled the commander's glass and then his own.
“You're the perfect emissary,” Wellington said.
“You're the youngest colonel in my army, you've had a brilliant career thus far and are clearly headed for a general's baton in a year or two. You've been mentioned countless times in dispatches, so your name's well-known in government circles. They'll give credence to what you say.”